An adventure to the North: Information About Lytle’s Family and a Dragon / Elvish War

Told from the eyes of Warlock Hewill Makit

Aside from my duties to the city of Pleasantville as the head of
sanitation, and head magic-user (for the time being might I add since
there are far more qualified magic-users in the realm), I have decided
to seek an advisor position to the King of Givemea; possibly starting a
council of Senators with the King’s permission. All of this
put aside, while I was designing the new sewer systems of
Pleasantville, I get a visit from my good friend and well regarded High
Priest, Solomon Pras. We talked about old times: fighting
bandits, kobolds, minotaurs, and of course, dragons. As time
passes, we eventually came to the subject of Gary, the Green.

Much time has passed since I’ve adventured
with Solomon; I didn’t realize how well he kept up with the whole
Green deal. I have been busy as intern mayor of Pleasantville for
a good year and now taking a smaller role as head of sanitation to
pursue a bigger role, Senator. Anyways, Solomon informed me that
the Greens are not finished. Kraktokrin (Gary's cousin) was back
to his old ways again. You see awhile ago Kraktokrin left a note
for our good, but unfortunately Elfish friend Lytle Boxer about the
Dragon/Elf War to the north. Solomon said the Avengers are going
to investigate the note Kraktokrin left.

The Avengers….formally know as Lytle Boxer,
Urza Van Burance, Solomon Pras, and Hewill Makit. We all met in
the town square, except for Urza. He could not accompany us on
the investigative journey to the north as he was now the mayor of
Pleasantville. Filling if for Urza was a skilled fighter named
Derick Stormbringer.

As the day of the journey approached, it was time to
dust of my pack, saddle up my horse, and prepare my spells. Oh
how I hate adventuring! Everything smelled like dead kobolds and
some of my spells have not been used it sometime. I had to read
back up and study the complex spells the Avengers would need for this
adventure. Near the final hour before leaving, I had a change of
heart about going with the Avengers to the north. I hate
traveling north since only bad things are up there (aka elves and what
not). I'm too old and at a different point in my life now to be
going adventuring, especially northward! Lytle's words of jewels
and Solomon's promises of gold, frankincense and mere were all too
attractive for me to pass up.

So the Avengers set forth north towards the capitol
city of Swatrs, Scontoft, possible even further if the information we
wanted is up there. We would be traveling through many Elvish
towns before we hit our destination. The first stop would be
through Swarfen. At the gate, the Elvish guards treated us very
terribly. As all know, the Avengers do not exactly hide our
movement so Swarfen knew we were coming, especially being an Elvish
city! But they treated the Avengers as if we stole something from
them. How typical, Elves and their egos! Hopefully one day
they will learn. After giving the guards an earful, we were let
in but told to not cause any problems or else. The guards paid an
especially keen eye on Lytle, possibly because he was the only elf
among us humans

It was late in the day and the Avengers had been on
the road for a couple days already….Lytle, Derick and I were
thirsty so we did what we always do when we settle down in a town for
the night….headed towards the bar. Not too much happened
that night, but it was a very good night. Good nights are
followed by bad mornings though; my headache hurt badly. Luckily
High Priest Solomon Pras found out some information while in this
town. The Elvish towns Moundsten and Silvenstenn had been totally
destroyed; burnt to the ground by dragons. Much like Clir was a
little over a decade ago.

The next city we entered was the Elvish capitol,
Scontoft. For some reason, Elves and their many, many troubles
found the Avengers in Scontoft. After being rudely accepted in by
the city guards, we found out the High Council of Scontoft wanted a
meeting with the Avengers. Before being let into the city
(actually even before hitting the city gate) I put an invisibility
spell on Lytle so the group would not get so much attention. It
did not work I guess since we were being "escorted" by Elves to their
High Council. (Lytle has been attracting attention in his
homeland for some reason).

In the meeting, we find out that Lytle's family has
been banished from Swatrs for crimes against the country. That is
all we were told, might I add told quite rudely. We plead our
Noble cause to the council about heading north for information and
possibly helping up there. We are permitted to leave and head
north under the accompany of three guards from the city and told to
head further north to find our information we seek. I think they were
ordered to come with us to follow Lytle who was hiding still.
(Great more elves with us!). The Elves names that accompanied us
were Gondor, (an older elf who seemed decent enough, but was still an
elf), Arden (younger than Gondor with a tact about him the Avengers did
not like), and Elkston (the youngest elf who thought the world is his
playground, watch him run). Elkston seemed a little
too…..how can I up it, information seeking for my and the groups
liking. He tried asking what spells I'm capable of casting (no
decent magic-user gives his secret away!).

Anyways, Elkston could not be trusted due to his
flamboyant ego. Arden was the same in a lesser degree.
Solomon spoke with Gondor about the Boxer family and found out that
they were banished for supposedly dealing with the drow race. It
seemed that Gondor didn't completely believe the story he tells, but
Elkston and Arden ate it up wholeheartedly.

We communicated with Lytle, who was shadowing the
group for a couple days while we headed towards Ponst. On the
way, we ran into an old friend, the Barbarian name Lortap. It was
known to the Avengers that Lytle took a polymorph self potion and came
upon us as Lortap. Lortap (aka Lytle) warned us of a score of
Ogres about a quarter mile down the road ready to ambush the
group. The Avengers, without the help of the egotistical elves
set up a preemptive ambush to counter the Ogres' ambush. They
were taken care of quite nicely might I add (lightning bolts go crack).

After the battle, the elves had a little more
respect for the Avenger seeing how we handed ourselves in battle
together very formidably. It's not the fact that we are great
fighters, clerics, or magic-users that make the Avengers so good; it's
our teamwork and ability to come up with plans to accomplish our
objectives that make us so deadly. After the battle and talking
with the Avengers, we realized we errored in letting the elves see how
we battle together…information comes at a price and should never
be given for free!

It took a lot of arguing with the elves, especially
Elkston in order to let Lortap be on his way. The Avengers knew
it was Lytle is disguise, but Elkston was wondering why a barbarian was
running around the Swatrs. After some time, they did let Lortap
the barbarian leaver. I wanted to give Lortap an invisibility
spell (and tried to), but Elkston interrupted my spell! Does he
know what can happen if you interrupt a magic-user casting a spell,
especially a complex one!!! Three little words…BOOM, BOOM,
BOOM!!! Luckily I was able to control the magic as I've cast
invisibility many times. Simple fighters, especially this elf do
not understand the power within magic!

We reached Ponst without anymore incidents. As
we found out in this town, the north is ridden with more
destruction. More reason for the Avengers to go north I
figure. On to Panstern!

We reached Panstern also uneventfully, which is
always a good thing. We racked up in the local gold piece inn
once again. Lytle had a plan to contact the Avengers right under
the noses of the elvish guards. Lytle used another polymorph self
potion and polymorphed into a different looking elf. As he
entered the gold piece inn, Gondor was sitting at a table waiting for
Lytle. He knew it was Lytle polymorphed, knew Lytle was following
us all along, and knew Lortap was actually Lytle. Gondor is quite
the astute elf; I'd almost consider him on the level of a
semi-intelligent human if he did not have such pointed ears.

He proceeds to tell Lytle that he (Gondor) is
actually a friend of Lytle's family. Gondor is here to help
us. He warned us that Elkston isn't what he appears to be.
Elkston has been reporting back to the High Council of Swarfen about
our movements. Gondor says that he is almost sure that Elkston
hasn't caught on that Lytle has been following the Avengers….for
now.

Lytle leaves the inn and finds which room I was
staying in. While he was gone, Solomon hears a ruckus. I
ask Solomon to describe this ruckus. As it turns out, Elkston and
Gondor were dueling for some reason in the hallway outside our rooms.

I see Lytle outside my window after also hearing
this ruckus. He tells me we have to get out of here; something
doesn't feel right about Elkston. I use the group's portable hole
and a complicated polymorph self spell to pick up the rest of the
Avengers.

Before we head out of town, I wanted to see what the
ruckus with Elkston and Gondor was about. I just had cast a
polymorph spell on myself so it would be easy to pass by as a flee
unseen my Elkston with the group in the portable hole. To our
dismay, we find Gondor's body slain in his room. High Priest
Solomon Pras casts speak with dead since we needed more information
from him. Information does not come cheap so we needed to take
advantage of the questions we have.

Solomon finds out that we must leave at once!
Elkston in actually in disguise as a powerful magic-user and Arden is a
much more powerful fighter than we figured him to be. After
getting the information we sought, Solomon lets Gondor's soul rest with
Paladine.
Next, the Avengers leave through the window of
Gondor's room. Elkston was actually outside the door while
Solomon was speaking with the dead, but could not get it because I used
a simple spell on the door, wizard lock. I thought to myself,
"He's a mighty magic-user….so easy to trick him though! I
tricked this powerful magic-user twice; once passing by him with a
polymorph self spell and once with a simple wizard lock!
Stupidity should not be rewarded!

I let everyone out of the portable hole once we were
outside of town and in the woods. We saw a huge ball of light
expanding from the city. Gondor gave Lytle a teleportation device
that would bring us to Pleasantville if we so needed. Turned out
we did need it. The Avengers did not know what this ball of
expanding light was; even I didn't know what it was, someone who
studied magic in my earlier days. It was actually a powerful
locate person spell, most likely made by Elkston. He must be
pretty powerful to make his own spells, but not the brightest bulb in
the batch of magic-users.

I end my journey back in Pleasantville with all of
the Avengers alive and well. As I finish my log, I realize how
much my bones hurt; I'm getting too old for this! Haven't I done
enough for the good of the world already? It is not my job to
save the north, only help the group accomplish our goal. I guess
if our goal is to help the north/elves in their battle, then so be
it. One more time around before hanging up the boots and retiring
from adventuring to become a Senator won't hurt…..